Synopsis: French dancers gather in a remote, empty school building to rehearse on a wintry night. The all-night celebration morphs into a hallucinatory nightmare when they learn their sangria is laced with LSD.

Review: You’re on a plane and before take-off the flight attendant makes the announcement to make sure you know where the exits are. You’re in a Broadway theater and the pre-show spiel mentions to locate the nearest exit in the event of an emergency. These are public services meant to help people that need to get to safety as quickly as possible should there be any danger. My public service message to you, dear reader, should you find yourself in a screening of Climax is to make sure you know where the nearest exit is so you can high tail it out of there if things get too out of hand for you. I sort of had to suffer through it (though not everyone in my screening stuck it out) and I feel like I’m owed some sort of survivors T-Shirt for my efforts.

It’s not like I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. French director Gaspar Noé has been pushing the boundaries of cinema and the tolerance of viewers for years. His passion to shock is like a child run amok and while Climax is definitely not the most extreme example of his assaults it ranks as one of the most disappointing because it starts out so strong. Had the movie stayed on its path and refrained from the director’s tired tropes meant to rattle our cages it could have signaled a maturity only hinted at in the first (electrifying) half hour.

Opening as most Noé films do with the closing credits before seguing into interviews with a troupe of dancers, Climax manages to create some interest right from the start as we’re introduced to an eclectic group who may not speak eloquently but who charm nonetheless with their off the cuff responses. The non-professional actors improvised almost all of the film and this green-ness works well in these opening scenes as the inexperienced folk gradually become more comfortable with the camera and being questioned by the off camera voice of Sofia Boutella (The Mummy), the only professional actor in the bunch who is also a trained dancer.

The first of two dance sequences is fairly astounding and showcases every person with their individual strengths. Limber, lithe, and fearless, the troupe performs a dance directly to the camera of a piece they’ve been working on for the last three days. It’s the bold and breathless culmination of an intense period of work that has brought them close together in a short time span. They still don’t know each other that well personally but being in that close proximity has forced an intimacy on them many people outside of the situation wouldn’t understand. I’d almost say this dance scene and the one that follows is worth the price of admission…but then again…

Soon after the dancing ends the drinking begins and it’s discovered someone has laced the sangria everyone is gulping down with LSD. That’s when the trouble starts as the dancers turn on themselves and each other in increasingly bizarre ways. Following the action in five or six long shots that take up the expanse of the 95 minute run time, Noé takes no prisoners as no taboo is off limits. Rape, incest, abuse, drug use, self-immolation, hate crimes…all are explored in gross, gory detail. I should add there’s a child thrown in the mix…and that’s never a good thing in a Noé film. Though I try to remain a spoiler-free source, I have to say that once a pregnant woman gets viciously kicked in the stomach and turns to self harm, I was sort of over what Noé was trying to sell me.

The amateur status of the actors in Noé’s nightmare begins to become a drawback the more the emotional stakes are raised and everything soon becomes a delirium of twisted limbs and screaming frenzy as the LSD-fueled rave rages on into the night. It makes the finale of 2018’s Suspiria look like an MGM musical by comparison. The insouciance displayed toward the audience is remarkable, I don’t think Noé would be disturbed at all to be told that a screening started off sold-out and by the time the film ended only two people were left in the theater. I’m not saying a movie shouldn’t challenging or willing expose a dark side but there’s a taste level threshold that’s crossed here you just can’t bounce back from.

I would strongly suggest skipping Climax completely, even though the first half is quite intriguing. Better yet, wait for it to show up on Amazon Prime in a few months and turn the film off once the dancing stops and the party begins.

Review: Pity the fool that crosses MI6 agent Lorraine Broughton and pity any audience member that second guesses the Oscar winner that plays her. Producer and star Charlize Theron (Prometheus) has fashioned a whopper of a role for herself and assembled a crack team of players to go along for the arse-kicking adrenaline-fueled ride. Even if Atomic Blonde doesn’t necessarily turn the Cold War spy thriller on its head, it sure gives it a helluva decent set of stylish somersaults.

Based on The Coldest City, a 2012 graphic novel written by Anthony Johnston and illustrated by Sam Hart, Atomic Blonde is set in November 1989 during the days leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall. This is no history lesson, though, as is pointed out at the beginning of the pretzel-like plot in the center of the action film. A MI6 agent stationed in Germany has been tasked with retrieving a watch with a list of double agents that could out several spies. When he’s killed in action, his old flame/colleague (Theron) is been sent behind enemy lines to finish the job and find a double agent plaguing the agency.

Lorraine is barely out of the airport before she’s battling KGB agents aiming to take her out, sparring with a MI6 superior (James McAvoy, Split) who may be harboring rogue notions, and rendezvous-ing with a French beauty (Sofia Boutella, TheMummy) with secrets of her own. All is not what is seems, however, as the twists start to come fast and furious during the final half of the picture. Told in flashback by a battered and bruised Lorraine to two high-ranking officials (Toby Jones, Muppets Most Wantedand John Goodman, Patriots Day), Kurt Johnstad’s screenplay sometimes zigs when it should zag but overall it packs the requisite punch.

Speaking of punches…whoa. Theron’s action sequences are of the intensely old-school rock ‘em and sock ‘em variety and they are downright thrilling. Early toussels in a car winding through a tunnel, an apartment complex, and a stylishly cinematic brawl staged in a, well, a cinema are mere appetizing morsels for the extended battle royale grand feast. Following Lorraine as she attempts to keep a key witness alive, director David Leitch (John Wick) makes the rumble in the East Berlin jungle look like it was shot in one long take by cleverly disguising his cuts. It’s not a showcase only for the filmmaker, though, as Theron smashingly bashes her way through a bunch of hapless goons down staircases and through abandoned rooms to a pulsing soundtrack of mid to late ‘80s classics. Taking her licking, she keeps on ticking and gets believably shell-shocked, bloodied, and winded along the way. Theron trained intensely for this role and it shows with every punch landed and every powerful kick to the chest she delivers, so much so that it’s hard to see when her stunt double steps in.

Were Theron not a producer of Atomic Blonde, I may have questioned some of the more risqué elements to the film as a product of some male ADHD fantasy featuring women in low cut blouses, high cut lingerie, or nothing at all. However, it doesn’t feel wholly exploitative but likely in line with the source material and period setting…but on the other hand a little Theron on Boutella action has an sizable erotic charge in even its most chaste moments.

While we’re on the subject, poor Boutella is in her second summer film of 2017 that fails to capitalize on her engaging appeal. After her mummy character played second banana to Tom Cruise in June she ends July without getting much to do but bed Theron and provide some necessary expository dialogue. I kept waiting for her to pop in to help Theron out but, alas, the only one that seems to show up is McAvoy and his over-the-top shenanigans.

In films such as these where it’s essential for key plot points to be manipulated throughout so the twists, when revealed, have a greater “gotcha” vibe there never seems to be a satisfying resolution. Thankfully, though Atomic Blonde has two endings too many the one it does close up shop on is a solid rounding off of any rough edges that remained. A prequel graphic novel was released in 2016 so should this one detonate positively with audiences, it’s possible we’ll see Theron back in action in no time. I’d welcome the return sooner rather than later.

Review: You’re going to hear from a lot of people that The Mummy, Universal’s first entry in their new Dark Universe franchise, is a baffling bomb. Those people aren’t totally wrong but they’re not completely off the mark either. The worst thing a movie can be is neither good nor bad but just mediocre and too much of this new take on The Mummy straddles that fence, stubbornly refusing to slump into schlock or get its ass into a higher-quality gear. It’s not a total wash but the potential was there to take a fun step forward and the studio is too, uh, wrapped up in their quest for a new charter film series that they’ve lost sight of the here and the now.

As most of these creature-features often do, The Mummy opens with a little history lesson concerning an ambitious Egyptian princess (Sofia Boutella, Kingsman: The Secret Service) seduced by evil forces that promise her eternal life. Clearing her way to the throne in a bloody rampage, she’s eventually captured and buried alive in a deluxe sarcophagus within an ultra-complex underground prison. Remaining hidden for thousands of years, she’s unearthed by two unscrupulous soldiers (Tom Cruise, Oblivionand Jake Johnson, Safety Not Guaranteed) looking for antiquities to sell on the black market in modern day Iraq. Once released from her prison, she wastes little time in bringing down a plane transporting her to London and proceeding to suck the life out of anyone that gets in her way, turning them into the walking dead for good measure. It’s up to Cruise and a pretty prehistorian (Annabelle Wallis, Annabelle) to end the madness, a task made more difficult when our Mummy Princess sets her sights on making Cruise her eternal mate.

The framework of plot supplied by a screenplay written by David Koepp (Jurassic Park), Christopher McQuarrie (Edge of Tomorrow), and Dylan Kussman (Flight) has potential to it but director Alex Kurtzman (People Like Us) never fully trusts the material, opting instead to let Cruise take up too much space and pushing others to the sidelines. Let’s not forget that in addition to the above brief outline, Cruise is introduced to the Prodigium, a secret group dedicated to hunting supernatural baddies and beasties. Led by Dr. Henry Jekyll (yep, the one and only), look closely during a visit to Prodigium’s lab for a few familiar creatures that may pop up in future Dark Universe entries.

I get the feeling that when the script for The Mummy was sent to Cruise, it was with the intent he consider taking on Dr. Jekyll (played here by a twinkle-eyed Russell Crowe, The Water Diviner) but Cruise missed the memo and just assumed he’d be the lead. Clearly written for a younger actor, everyone in the film at one time or another looks at Cruise (who’s still in fine shape and loves a good stunt sequence) and clearly is thinking, “You’re too old for this role!” His chemistry with both of his leading ladies is strained and it becomes the Cruise show the moment he arrives onscreen with the titular character taking a frustrating back-seat to the A-list star.

Crowe seems keen on having some fun and while his storyline could be excised from the film entirely, he at least has the right idea of what his contributions are. Knowing that Universal plans to craft a new franchise from their Stable of Scary, I wonder if the whole Prodigium business was folded in late in the game to tee up the Dark Universe. Poor Wallis has a role that is entirely exposition, I don’t think she’s given one line that isn’t specifically meant to explain or clarify so the performance feels like the appendix it was written to be. The true star here is Boutella and whenever she’s onscreen the film starts to crackle and pop only to be muffled by Cruise’s overbearing presence. I like Cruise quite a lot but even I must admit he’s been given too much room to play.

Amidst a bunch of hokum happenings and a screenplay that’s pretty pokey, there are a handful of slick moments of fun that hint at what the movie could have been had it found a better focus. A mid-air disaster is staged with edge-of-your-seat excitement and an underwater chase managed to make me hold my breath as Cruise and Wallis try to outswim a horde of the undead. Being released in 2D and 3D formats, I caught it in 3D and since so much of the film is set at night or in dark underground lairs I’d advise going for a 2D screening which might produce clearer visuals.

There’s nothing I look forward to more than a good old-fashioned monster movie. I don’t need flashy special effects or 3D gimmickry to get on board, just give me a good creature, a decent plot, and invested performances and I’m happy. While Universal’s reboot of The Mummy doesn’t consistently hit any of the above specifications, it grazes them long enough to produce a somewhat enjoyable but ultimately misguided first step into a new franchise involving their classic catalog of monsters.

Synopsis: An ancient princess is awakened from her crypt beneath the desert bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia and terrors that defy human comprehension.

Release Date: June 9, 2017

Thoughts: If you didn’t know any better, the first few moments of this first look at Universal’s 2017 reboot of The Mummy may feel like you’ve fallen into another Mission: Impossible entry. There’s Tom Cruise looking quite Cruise-ish in a cargo plane carrying the remains of an ancient princess. Before they can even get through customs (or land the aircraft) trouble brews with Cruise (Jack Reacher: Never Go Back) winding up in a body bag. What’s so nice about this thrilling teaser is that is leaves you with more questions than answers. Where the 1932 original was a classic horror, its 1999 reboot owed more to Indiana Jones than to its source material. This new take on The Mummy, however, looks to blend the best of previous incarnations. With Russell Crowe (The Water Diviner) and Annabelle Wallis (Annabelle) along for the adventure under the direction of Alex Kurtzman (People Like Us), look for this one to be unwrapped in a prime summer slot.

Thoughts: It’s probably a wise move from Paramount to release the first look at Star Trek Beyond mere days before that other Star prefixed yarn arrives. After all, Star Wars: The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams helmed Star Trek’s reboot and successful sequel and moviegoers ponying up for the next Star Wars chapter are likely also interested in catching the new adventure of Captain Kirk and the crew of the Starship Enterprise. With new director Justin Lin (Fast & Furious 6) aboard and Chris Pine (Into the Woods), Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana (Out of the Furance), and others reenlisting alongside fresh faces Idris Elba (Prometheus) and Sofia Boutella (Kingsman: The Secret Service) this will be a test to see if Trek can continue to boldly go with Abrams manning the ship. This preview is ever so slightly too rock ‘n roll and bombastic…but it also clearly gets the message across that there’s a new captain on deck.